​B’nai B’rith International decries the terrorist attack in the town of Halamish, which left three people dead: Yosef Salomon (70) and his children Chaya Salomon (46) and Elad Salomon (36). On July 21, a Palestinian man jumped the fence surrounding Halamish, knocked on the Solomon’s door, and proceeded to stab a family celebrating Shabbat and the birth of a new grandchild. Yosef Salomon’s wife, Tova Salomon, was also assaulted, but survived the attack. Other family members survived the attack by running upstairs and barricading themselves until help arrived.
 
According to the Times of Israel, the funeral was held on Sunday in Modi’in, Israel, and attended by thousands of people.
 
Israel faces threats by terrorists on a daily basis. Incitement that leads to these horrendous acts of violence must end. B’nai B’rith offers its condolences to the victims and their families.
 
B’nai B’rith has a relationship with Halamish.
 
Last year, a devastating fire broke out in this community, and B’nai B’rith International, along with B’nai B’rith Europe, allocated money from our Israel Emergency Fund to help during the community’s rebuilding process.
 
To the Halamish community, our thoughts are with you as you mourn your neighbors and as you continue to restore your homes and businesses. 

UPDATE: Click here to read our letter to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.​

B’nai B’rith International President Gary P. Saltzman and CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin have issued the following statement:

We are deeply concerned at the pro-Palestinian bias displayed in a new State Department report that severely mischaracterizes the reality in the region.

In the new annual Country Reports on Terrorism, the State Department blames Israel for Palestinian violence against Israelis. It is astonishing that State is echoing the false Palestinian narrative. If it were not released by the State Department, it would be easy to mistake the inflammatory and accusatory language as coming directly from the Palestinians.

According to the report, a “lack of hope” drives Palestinian violence.
 
Israel is not driving the violence committed by the Palestinians. It’s Palestinian leadership—Fatah and Hamas— that incites violence against Israelis on a daily basis. The Palestinian leadership even compensates terrorists and their families with cash as a reward for carrying out an attack on Israelis.

President Trump himself criticized Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas for incitement and paying stipends to terrorists, and Ambassador Nikki Haley emphatically rejects similar language when it’s used at the United Nations.

If it is the intention of the administration to re-start the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, this report sets it up as a non-starter. We urge the State Department to correct its imbalanced narrative.

An exhibit featuring the last Swiss Holocaust survivors went on display at the plenary session of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) in Geneva in late June, with the support of Switzerland’s Federal Department of Foreign Affairs.
 
The Last Swiss Holocaust Survivors was produced by Gamaraal Foundation, an organization that supports needy Holocaust survivors in Switzerland, with an additional emphasis placed on projects in Holocaust education. The exhibit was shown for the first time at the Swiss Embassy in Berlin during the official hand-over ceremony as Switzerland took over the presidency of the IHRA earlier this year.
 
B'nai B'rith member Anita Winter, founder and president of the Gamaraal Foundation, introduced the exhibit at the IHRA with a personal message about her father, a Holocaust survivor who fled Germany and took refuge in Switzerland during the war.
 
“If Hitler’s regime would have been completely successful, I would not be standing here today,” Winter said.
 
“Not many were so lucky like my parents and had the chance to start a new life in Switzerland and for that I am very thankful, more than I can tell you in words. Based on my family history, the memory of the Holocaust, the transfer of knowledge and the discussion of it are therefore very dear to my heart. This was my personal motivation to create the exhibition The Last Swiss Holocaust Survivors,” Winter said.
 
Esther Hörnlimann, the project manager of the exhibition, said that “its primary aim is to reach young people who will soon not have the chance to meet survivors in person.”
 
“They need to grapple with the Holocaust in order to become aware of their own responsibility as human beings, so that they will take a stand against any similar horrible crimes being committed again anywhere in the world, against religious, ethnic or other minorities,” Hörnlimann said. “With the last survivors of the Holocaust we also lose the last witnesses. In this sense it was the last possible moment in which to realize such an exhibition at all.”
 
Most of the Holocaust survivors in Switzerland were not native born: some fled to Switzerland during the war, others came after the liberation for recuperation, and yet others arrived later as refugees from communism during the Hungarian Revolution in 1956 or the Prague Spring of 1968, inter alia.
 
Details from the exhibit can be seen on the websites of the exhibition (https://www.last-swiss-holocaust-survivors.ch/de) and the Gamaraal Foundation (http://www.gamaraal.com/).
 
Click here to learn about how Winter’s parents survived the Holocaust

B’nai B’rith International President Gary P. Saltzman and CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin have issued the following statement:
 
​B’nai B’rith leaders were present on July 18 when thousands of people gathered in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to pay tribute to those killed and injured in a terror attack 23 years ago on the Argentine-Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) Jewish community center building. On July 18, 1994, a suicide bomber drove a truck filled with explosives into the AMIA building, killing 85 people and wounding 300.
 
The commemoration was on Pasteur Street, the original location of the AMIA building.
 
Though it has long been widely recognized that Iran and Hezbollah were behind this horrendous crime, to this date, no one has been brought to justice.
 
On July 17, B’nai B’rith International Director of Latin American Affairs Eduardo Kohn and B’nai B’rith Chile President Jaime Fuchs participated in an event in Buenos Aires hosted by the Latin American Jewish Congress to discuss terrorism and how to combat it.

Kohn met with several government officials including Argentine Foreign Minister Jorge Faurie, Argentine Human Rights Secretary Claudio Avruj, Ambassador of Israel to Argentina Ilan Sztulman and Judge Sandra Arroyo Salgado, widow of Alberto Nisman. Nisman was a prosecutor assigned to the AMIA building bombing attack and died under suspicious circumstances on Jan. 18, 2015. Nisman had announced to the public, several days before his death, that he would present his findings to the Argentine Congress on Jan. 19, 2015.
 
Argentine President Mauricio Macri hosted the AMIA Executive Committee in La Casa Rosada (the House of Government) on July 14th, and Macri’s Chief of Staff Marcos Peña led the official delegation that attended the commemoration event on July 18.

It is the duty of the Jewish people to keep the memory of the AMIA bombing alive and continue to call for justice. It is imperative that we remember that acts of terror are not just a thing of the past, and we must continue to honor those who lives were lost or forever altered in this senseless bloodshed.
 
B’nai B’rith has been at the forefront of advocating for justice in the AMIA case from the very beginning. We will never forget the victims and their families, or Alberto Nisman, whose bravery called attention to this unresolved attack. 

B’nai B’rith International President Gary P. Saltzman and CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin have issued the following statement:
 
B’nai B’rith International mourns the 5th anniversary of the terrorist attack in Burgas, Bulgaria. On July 18, 2012, a suicide bomber attacked a bus full of tourists, and killed five Israelis and their Bulgarian bus driver, and injured 32.
 
In February 2013, the Bulgarian government released a report stating that Hezbollah was responsible for the terrorist attack. At the time, Hezbollah was not on the European Union’s list of terrorists, and we urged the EU to designate it as such. The EU ultimately recognized the “military wing” of the terrorist organization, which makes a mockery of directing any kind of punishment at the Hezbollah organization, since all monies that flow to it are fungible. The United States does acknowledge Hezbollah as a terrorist group.
 
B’nai B’rith remembers the victims and their families.

Holds “Coffee with your Congressman” Program With Residents
 
B’nai B’rith International President Gary P. Saltzman and CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin have issued the following statement:
 
U.S. Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-Pa.) toured one of B’nai B’rith International’s housing facilities for low-income senior citizens to meet with residents and discuss the critical importance of housing for adults with limited means. B’nai B’rith Apartments in Wilkes-Barre, Pa. is a residential facility sponsored by B’nai B’rith in partnership with the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
 
Cartwright toured the building, which included visiting three apartments, the TV common area and the library and computer rooms.
 
“I am here today at this low-income subsidized housing unit because this is part of the American fabric—that people who are of limited means will not be shuffled off to the curb, they will [be] treated with respect and dignity. This is something we as Americans have come to expect,” Cartwright said.
 
This type of housing is in constant demand, and researchers say for every low-income senior housing apartment nationwide there are 10-12 seniors waiting for a spot.
 
Cartwright held a “Coffee with your Congressman” program after his tour, where residents sat at tables and asked the congressman his stance on social security, healthcare and affordable housing. Cartwright spent about 15 minutes at each table.

Before the tour began Cartwright met with B’nai B’rith International Assistant Director for Aging Policy Evan Carmen; B’nai B’rith Apartments Board President David Schwager; B’nai B’rith Apartments Regional Property Manager Marlene Siberski; B’nai B’rith Apartments Community Manager Kerry Palmiero; and B’nai B’rith Apartments Assistant Manager Robert Guzenski to learn about the building, the services offered, B’nai B’rith’s history with affordable housing and the urgent need for government funding for these programs.

Two persons affiliated with Amos Towers in Scranton, Pa., another B’nai B’rith-funded building, attended the event:  Property Manager Louis Danzico and Board President Margie Shapiro.
 
“We are so pleased that Congressman Matt Cartwright toured B’nai B’rith Apartments, and spent so much time with the residents one-on-one. It is imperative that members of Congress see firsthand how essential low-income senior housing is,” Carmen said.
 
B’nai B’rith Apartments is the first building B’nai B’rith sponsored in its affiliation with HUD, opening in 1971. Currently, the B'nai B'rith Senior Housing Network in the United States consists of 38 buildings in 27 communities, encompassing more than 4,000 apartment units and serving more than 8,000 people.
 
“We are concerned about the fact that all of us here, this is subsidized housing, the majority of it, we want to be assured that subsidized housing is going to continue, or actually, be expanded is what we would like to see,” B’nai B’rith Apartments Tennant’s Association President Tom Haggerty said. “I love it here, I am happy here.”

B’nai B’rith and JRJ Confer Citations on Jewish Holocaust Heroes

One falsified hundreds of documents, allowing children and their parents to escape from Holland. One, a dentist, hid the very sick at Auschwitz-Birkenau, so they would not be sent to the gas chambers. Another protected and hid Jewish children in the south of France before smuggling many to safety. Another rescued about 1,000 fellow Polish Jews, mainly infants, youngsters and teenagers, via a land route and a smuggling operation into Slovakia. One, among his many rescue efforts—sometimes directed from a hiding place—contacted the Hungarian underground and financed the smuggling of Jewish refugees by train from Budapest to Damascus, saving some 300 children.

Though they were in different countries, and used different methods, the end result of these efforts was the same: Jews saved other Jews from murder at the hands of the Nazis.

The brave and often overlooked stories of Jews who rescued fellow Jews during the Holocaust got special attention Monday when several of these heroes received deep gratitude and recognition for their valiant efforts.

“Rescuers themselves deserved something better than to be forgotten, having shown extraordinary courage,” said Dr. Mark Colb upon receiving the citation on behalf of his father, Ben Zion Kalb, who rescued Polish Jews by smuggling them into Slovakia. Mark Colb also said he was grateful to B’nai B’rith for focusing on this issue now.

B’nai B’rith International and the Committee to Recognize the Heroism of Jews who Rescued Fellow Jews During the Holocaust (JRJ) presented Jewish rescuers citations to individuals, recognizing their courageous efforts, and those of their families, to ensure the survival of Jews during the Holocaust.

Hadassa Carlibach, daughter of Rabbi Zalman Schneerson and Sara Schneerson told the audience about her father: “During the war, he had a knack of anticipating … in a practical way that something will have to be done about something.” She said there was no stopping him in his rescue efforts. Carlibach, too, received an award for her efforts as a teenager helping her parents save Jews.

B’nai B’rith International CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin said at the event: “Thousands of Jews were saved by other Jews across Europe during the Holocaust. Many of these rescuers, rather than flee to ensure their own safety, chose to help other Jews escape.” Later he said: “It is critical that the effort of Jewish rescuers is remembered and we commit ourselves to sharing these stories that remind us all of the unique role these Jewish rescuers played in our history.” And he concluded after the event: “There are so many individual stories. It falls on us to make sure these stories are told to personalize what happened.”

Menachem Rosensaft accepted a citation on behalf of his mother, Hadassah Bimko-Rosensaft for her efforts to ensure the survival of fellow Jews in Auschwitz-Birkenau. Menachem Rosensaft said that at gatherings of survivors, his mother was told over and over: “You don’t remember me but you saved my life.” He concluded that, though she lost her first husband and child to the gas chamber, she helped others and “perhaps she found strength and purpose in saving others, especially children.”

B’nai B’rith World Center-Jerusalem Director Alan Schneider, who traveled from Jerusalem for this event, noted: “Nearly 20 years ago, I was introduced by a dear friend and colleague—Holocaust survivor Haim Roet—to the phenomenon of the rescue of Jews by fellow Jews during the Holocaust. Like many people introduced to this topic for the first time, I too was surprised—even skeptical—that such cases existed let alone anything that could be described as a phenomenon. Intensive reading, research and activity on this issue since then has proved me and others wrong.”

Schneider a founding member of the JRJ and laid the groundwork for the Jewish Rescuers Citation.

Author and historian Mordecai Paldiel concluded the event. His extensive research on the topic of Jewish rescue has uncovered many stories. He said that many Jews were “actively involved” in trying to save other Jews. And he noted more should still be done. 

The Jewish Rescuer’s Citation was established in 2011 to pay honor and respect to Jewish rescue of other Jews during the Shoah. To date, more than 170 Jewish heroes have been honored for their daring rescue activities in Germany, France, Hungary, Greece, Slovakia, Yugoslavia, Russia, Lithuania, Poland and Holland.

Click here to read the full stories of these rescuers.

UNESCO Names Hebron’s Old City to List of World Heritage Sites in Danger
 
B’nai B’rith International President Gary P. Saltzman and CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin have issued the following statement:
 
B’nai B’rith International strongly condemns the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) World Heritage Committee (WHC) for naming Hebron’s Old City and the Cave of the Patriarchs to the list of World Heritage Sites in Danger. The vote took place by way of a secret ballot in Krakow, Poland, at WHC’s 41st session. Out of the 21 member states, 12 countries voted in favor of the anti-Israel resolution, three voted against it and six countries abstained.   
 
Unlike countless cultural and religious sites in the broader Middle East, the Cave of the Patriarchs is in no danger. The Cave of Patriarchs is open to people of diverse faiths. However, until Israel gained control of Hebron in 1967, Jews had not been allowed to enter one of Judaism’s holiest sites for centuries. Israel exemplified its open and tolerant society when the sacred site was opened to all visitors.
 
By contrast, the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS)—an advisory body of experts to the WHC—pointed out that the Palestinian proposal focused too heavily only on eras of Muslim rule in the city, giving scant attention to the Jewish historical connection to Hebron and the Cave of the Patriarchs. ICOMOS did not endorse the Palestinian proposal.
 
The WHC decision is yet another instance of UNESCO erasing and appropriating Jewish history. Using the international community and its institutions to assist the Palestinians in furthering a false narrative is an appalling waste of time and money, and is further proof of global efforts to delegitimize Israel.
 
UNESCO’s blatant disregard for the history of the Jewish people must end if the organization is to retain any relevance in the future in the areas of cultural and historical preservation.

Met with Prime Ministers, Diplomats and Jewish Leaders
 
B’nai B’rith International President Gary P. Saltzman and CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin have issued the following statement:
 
B’nai B’rith International has concluded a leadership mission to two key Caucasus states: Georgia and Azerbaijan. Both countries are vital partners—in a strategically important region—of the United States and Israel, and home to long-standing and highly integrated Jewish communities.
 
B’nai B’rith leaders and supporters met with senior policymakers and figures from Jewish and non-Jewish communities, to further encourage the respective nations' strong relationships with Israel and other democracies, and to highlight their notable lack of ingrained societal anti-Semitism.
 
In Tbilisi, Georgia, and Baku, Azerbaijan, the delegation met with officials including the Georgian and Azerbaijani prime ministers, the ranking American and Israeli diplomats in the capitals, communal rabbis and other Jewish leaders, Georgia's chairman of parliament, the patriarch of the Georgian Orthodox Church, Azerbaijan's deputy foreign minister and the chairman of the Azeri State Committee on Religious Associations.
 
Our delegation was led by B’nai B’rith International President Gary P. Saltzman and Executive Vice President and CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin. Other mission participants were Eric Engelmayer, B’nai B’rith senior vice president; Ira Bartfield, B’nai B’rith Center for Jewish Identity chair; Kathryn Bartfield; Dr. Steven Horowitz, member of the B’nai B’rith Executive Board of Directors; Dr. Sandra Horowitz, member of the International Council of B’nai B’rith; Gerald Platt; Michelle Stein; Michal Mariaschin and B’nai B’rith Director of U.N. and Intercommunal Affairs David Michaels, who coordinated the trip. 

Moment of Silence Called for Palestinians, Implying Equivalence with Holocaust Victims, is Particularly Galling
 
B’nai B’rith International President Gary P. Saltzman and CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin have issued the following statement:
 
B’nai B’rith International denounces the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) World Heritage Committee (WHC) for adopting a resolution that rejects Israeli sovereignty in Jerusalem.
 
The meeting took place in Krakow, Poland, mere miles from Auschwitz. At the request of Israel's ambassador, a moment of silence was held by participants for the victims of the Holocaust. The Cuban delegate, however, then requested that this be followed by a moment of silence for Palestinians killed in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict—wildly offensive for the absurd implied equivalency to Holocaust victims, and also made perverse by the fact that the wording of the request made it a commemoration of "all" Palestinians killed in conflict, thus including numerous terrorists, whose goal it was to dehumanize and murder Jews in our era. While many delegates stood for Jews murdered in the Holocaust, there was an appalling number that also stood for the terrorists and applauded.
 
B'nai B'rith commends the three countries that voted against UNESCO's latest anti-Israel resolution: Burkina Faso, Jamaica and the Philippines. However, the decision of the four members of the European Union on the WHC—Croatia, Finland, Poland and Portugal—to merely abstain on the resolution is highly disappointing.
 
In June, B’nai B’rith wrote to delegates of the WHC urging them to reject such absurdly biased, inappropriate and damaging resolutions. Click here to read that letter.